LEAVE THE WORLD PLOT BEHIND (spoilers)
The book was horrible.
The movie is, pretty much, a perfect adaptation of the book.
And that makes the movie just as horrible, or possibly worse.
I swear, this is probably thee worst movie of the year, and the only reason you should watch this piece of junk is to learn what not to do.
I should have listened to my mom, who walked out after the first 30 minutes and shouted, “This movie is going nowhere! I’m going back to my Korean dramas!”
My mom was right. 30 minutes in, and the story really didn’t have much to say. The simple who, what, why, when, and where, questions were not answered. For some reason, this director thought he could entertain the audience by playing creepy piano music, instead of telling an interesting story. 90 minutes in, I still wasn’t sure what I was watching. And then…the movie just ended.
So what is Leave the World Behind about? Stop reading now because I’m about to spill this “awesome” plot, whose book won NPR’s highest honor.
A rich family wants to take a vacation out of the city. Their timing couldn’t have been better, because just when they leave their city, a foreign country, who we never get to know, attacks the United States. They begin with a cyber attack to paralyze our internet and cyber-infrastructure. This, of course, leads to an oil tanker beaching itself, at the same beach of our vacationing family. Talk about coincidence.
Why did this oil tanker beach itself? Who knows? The director/screenwriter didn’t explain it. But you don’t need to explain it, this is the movies! But you should understand the metaphor behind it, and the lesson, which is – oil tankers are like whales, and they can beach themselves for no apparent reason.
That night, the homeowner and his daughter of the vacation rental show up because there is a blackout in the city. And now everyone is staying together in this beautiful luxury mansion.
Anybody see a plot? Nope…
The days pass, and the situation gets worse. There’s no shortage of food or water, but their daughter can’t get any internet, and she really needs to watch the last episode of Friends. I understand, Friends was a damn good show. A lot better than this movie, and the book, put together. This movie would have been better if they’d just cut to a few full episodes of Friends.
Our vacationers try to make the best of the situation, but things really don’t get much better. And they can’t get the TV to work! The vacationer husband tries to drive to town to find answers, but because his GPS doesn’t work, and he’s not a real man, he can’t find even a simple drug store. Well, he is a university professor, so maybe this is canon to reality.
The situation doesn’t get easier for our vacationers. The daughter still wants to watch Friends, the animals in the forest are congregating weirdly since the internet went out. Why? Again, I get no explanation, but I can only expect that weird things happen when animals stop being featured on YouTube. So the vacationers plan to flee.
Well, our vacation family’s plan to flee doesn’t get too far, because the only route into the city is blocked by white Teslas, on auto drive, who have crashed into each other. Now, only white Teslas are crashing, not other cars with auto drive. The hidden metaphor here is that the Obamas, who are the producers of this movie, really don’t like Elon Musk.
The vacation family returns back to their vacation rental, and the homeowners welcome them back. There’s a bit of sexual tension between the two families. Strangely, the homeowner’s daughter flirts with the vacationing husband, and then tells her father that she actually is scared the vacationing husband may want to sleep with her. But she’s fearing the wrong dude. It’s the vacationing son who is creeping on her.
Let me remind you, this is an apocalypse movie, not Big Brother.
The next day, the creeper’s teeth fall out – because – no reason is given. The vacationing husband and homeowner father head to his contractor’s house for help. The contractor is your cliche American. He loves the Dallas Cowboys, loves his flag, and – of course – is a racist.
Meanwhile, our vacationing daughter has taken off for no reason. Her mother, and the homeowner’s daughter, run into the forest to find her. Instead of finding the daughter, they run into crazy animals who got their internet cut. Luckily, through a bit of yelling, they fend off the animals. When the coast clears, they realize the city is being bombed. By who? Who knows. But I know one thing, it would have been a lot more interesting if the stories in the city were told – not this one.
Luckily, the daughter has escaped to a house down the street. No one is home. She finds a bunker with a DVD selection. She finds her Friends episode, she pops in the DVD, hits play, and the movie ends.
This movie is a 2 1/2-hour waste of time. There was no payoff to any setup. The characters were flatter than Joe Biden’s brain waves. The dialogue was cheesy. Julia Robert’s dancing was horrible. Kevin Bacon – why was he in the movie? His part was literally five minutes long.
All joking aside, it is very apparent that the story is trying to push the following narratives:
- Blacks are stereotyped as being poor and uneducated.
- Even if blacks are wealthy, they are still stuck in the basement
- In the end, people of all ethnicities, and tribes, need to work together to stay alive
But because there was no story to be found, the messages were not being relayed efficiently.
Just how bad is this movie? It’s so horrible, I can’t analyze it.
Are the Obamas the new Michael Bay?
GRADE: F
Steve Young
